Enjoy!

The Long Way Home

Part 16

The New Toy

Chapter 2/3

Sasuke had been too quiet. Well, quieter than usual today and Naruto did not want to ask why. Asking why generally just made Sasuke ignore him and at the moment, Sasuke wasn't exactly ignoring him, just only speaking whenever absolutely necessary. Strangely he wasn't getting the feeling that he had done something wrong. Sasuke seemed amiable enough, for Sasuke. He just seemed a little listless was all.

They had left town just this morning and had sat down at midday to eat for a change. Probably because in the last town Naruto had bought the pair of them a strange kind of sweet dessert. It wasn't cold but probably still wouldn't last long in the heat so they had to eat it as early as possible and Naruto felt like he needed the treat.

Sasuke, who generally shunned sweets whenever presented with one, took the proffered little tub of cream like substance without a word and sat himself down by the roadside to eat. Naruto had sat down next to him and only then realised his folly of not getting any spoons to eat it with. He looked over at Sasuke to see that Sasuke had solved the dilemma by the expedient method of scooping the cream out of the tub with his fingers and eating it that way.

So Naruto merely shrugged and did the same. It was a little sticky but it tasted like vanilla and was very nice. Not that you'd know to look at Sasuke's face. Sasuke might as well have been eating grass for all the enjoyment he seemed to be getting out of it. He didn't appear to hate it though either, he just didn't seem to care one way or the other.

Well there was one way to get Sasuke out of whatever funk he was in and that was to annoy the shit out of him. Even an angry Sasuke was better than this. So as casually as he could, Naruto ran a creamy finger against the side of Sasuke's face before going back to eating as though nothing had happened.

Sasuke stopped immediately though, reached up and wiped at the cream, looked at his fingers and then frowned at Naruto. Naruto pretended to ignore him. Sasuke didn't bite at his antagonistic behavior though and after licking the cream off his fingers, returned to his treat.

So naturally, Naruto did it again.

"What the hell is your problem?" Sasuke asked annoyed, wiping the cream off his face for a second time.

"'What?" Naruto replied innocently.

He made himself appear casual, like nothing at all was amiss, but really he was tensed for a retaliation. And Sasuke would retaliate. He had to.

So this was why when Sasuke made to tip the rest of his dessert over Naruto's head, Naruto was on his feet and tearing off, over the road and into the forest between them and the river. Sasuke would chase him, he knew he would chase him.

Old Sasuke might have ignored him and been happy to travel the rest of the day in solitude but new Sasuke coupled with the ever present competitive Sasuke wouldn't let him get away. It was about as playful as Sasuke got, being competitive the way he was, and Naruto made sure to make use of it at every available opportunity.

The only problem here was that Sasuke was a faster runner over a short distance. Naruto had found that when Sasuke ran he moved like lightning... for about the first hundred meters but Naruto could outdistance him for anything longer than that.

Sasuke had issues pacing himself despite his rants to Naruto about being patient. Or perhaps he just wasn't all that patient around Naruto, who knew? But either way, if Naruto wanted to win this race he needed to get far, fast or Sasuke would -

He felt one of his feet go out from beneath him as Sasuke managed to catch up to him and trip him. He rolled in the dead leaves of the forest floor, hoping to get back to his feet before Sasuke could follow up the attack.

Unfortunately Sasuke was now on top of him, pinning his arms down onto the ground with his knees and Naruto couldn't shift Sasuke's weight without doing some real damage. But he figured it was worth it as he looked up into Sasuke's face and saw the smug half smirk. At least Sasuke seemed to be more or less back to normal now. It was even worth it as he poured what was left of the cream into Naruto's hair.

"You can't win," Sasuke informed him.

"Depends on your definition of winning," Naruto told him with a grin.

Sasuke frowned at that and went to move off him. But as soon as Naruto's hands were free, he grabbed Sasuke's waist and rolled him till he was the one splayed out on his back and Naruto was hovering over him. He took little time to enjoy it though and leant down for a kiss, knowing he was probably getting cream on Sasuke's face and caring very little about the ranting he would hear about it later.

So Naruto was about to think his little game had been a victory with Sasuke kissing him back but a second later Sasuke moved like he wanted to pull away and Naruto gave him the room, confusion clearly written on his face.

"What's wrong?"

"We had sex just last night," Sasuke reminded him. "A lot."

"Um, yeah I know, I was there. So?"

"So, I thought we were over the sex every few hours thing."

"Uh, yeah. I still don't get your point. Look just because I kiss you doesn't mean I want to have sex or anything else, it's just a kiss."

Sasuke didn't look particularly angry, in fact he had the same expression as before the chase and that bummed Naruto out a lot more to see.

"That's your problem. I'm not your boyfriend, we aren't dating. We have sex to combat frustration, that's all."

Naruto had almost laughed out loud at the mere suggestion of Sasuke being his boyfriend but he stopped himself in time.

"It's fun too, isn't it?"

"That's not my point."

Naruto sat up, giving Sasuke his space. Obviously this had been bugging Sasuke before now. It was entirely possible that this was what had been bugging him in the first place and Naruto still didn't understand why.

"I don't get it. We aren't allowed to fool around anymore?"

"I didn't say that. But acting like this... I told you before, not to project. I'm not your surrogate for having a real relationship."

It took a little while for Naruto to remember, but eventually he did remember a conversation they'd had like this before. It was before they'd even started getting off together, well before the sex. Sasuke had seemed concerned that Naruto was confused over having a physically intimate friendship with having an actual romantic relationship.

"I told you I'm not confused about that. I know the difference."

"Then you should act like it," Sasuke told him plainly.

"This is one of those weird Sasuke moments isn't it? I never get what's okay with you. So what, we're allowed to fuck but not to kiss for the sake of kissing now?"

Sasuke was watching him closely. "Perhaps we should forgo the sex for a while after all."

Now Naruto was really surprised. "What?!"

"At least with each other," Sasuke clarified.

Naruto screwed up his face in distaste. "Are you really suggesting that? No way. I can distance myself fine thanks, I don't need to prove anything to you. I don't want to either."

"Actually you do need to prove something, to both of us really. Sleeping with someone else would be the most expedient way of doing so."

"And I told you that I didn't feel the need to, even if I wanted to!"

"Because you have me," Sasuke clarified.

"Well, yeah. Do you seriously think I'm going to start a deep and meaningful relationship with a stranger in the small amount of time we're in a town for? What's the point?"

"I didn't mean you should fall in love and get married dobe. It's just sex, that's the point. You keep talking about having fun, why should that fun be limited to what you do with me?"

Naruto was unsure about that. He didn't like the idea of being with someone for just one night and leaving town the next day. It seemed sort of cold to him.

"It's not really my style," Naruto admitted.

"Because you have an alternative," Sasuke told him. "If you didn't have that alternative, if you weren't satisfied, you might look harder. At least now that you are more comfortable with the whole sex thing it shouldn't be such an issue."

"You want me to have sex with other people?"

"I'm suggesting that it might be healthier for you to have that option available to you."

Now Naruto was really confused. "Since when do you care about stuff like that?"

"I don't. I just don't appreciate being a stand in for your pent up emotional frustrations. Physical was fine, but I don't need you acting like kissing for the sake of kissing is okay when it is clearly something friends do not generally do. If you want random kisses you can easily use other people for that and short term lust will provide a better outlet for it than I am willing to endure."

By this point Naruto was getting more than a little annoyed. As far as he was concerned, things like this had been okay before now and sure, he was a little bit more open now with what he wanted than before but since when wasn't he allowed to steal a kiss? And how did that make him emotionally needy or whatever the hell Sasuke was suggesting?

"It's not like you've exactly been sleeping around either," Naruto pointed out in a tone that suggested he thought it scored a good point.

Sasuke shrugged. "Other people annoy me."

"I annoy you," Naruto reminded him.

"You I'm stuck with," Sasuke shot back.

"So it's not like you have to fall in love and get married, teme. It's just sex," Naruto parroted.

"Unemotional and disconnected sex isn't a concept I have a problem with," Sasuke informed him bluntly. "Besides," he added with a frown. "I'm not entirely sure I would be interested in girls either romantically or physically."

The admission probably shouldn't have shocked Naruto so much but it still did. Sasuke had never shown the slightest interest in any girl before despite the many who would line up to sleep with him given the chance. But then again he hadn't shown any interest in any other guys either.

He supposed he should have been clued in by the fact that Sasuke seemed to enjoy sex with him but then Naruto enjoyed it too and he still liked girls. He'd just assumed the same thing for Sasuke too.

Well it could still be true, the idea of Sasuke being romantically interested in anyone was a pretty strange concept all things considered. But since the only person Sasuke had seemed to have a physical interest in had turned out to be a guy, well...

"Seriously?"

Sasuke shrugged like it was unimportant but Naruto could see the faint pink spread over his cheeks.

Sasuke probably wasn't embarrassed about the idea but annoyed about the sharing of it. Personal stuff with Sasuke was very personal and Sasuke generally liked to keep it that way. But keeping it to himself while insisting Naruto go out and find girls would have seemed hypocritical and Sasuke would have hated that even more.

"Possibly. It seems that way," Sasuke admitted.

"So, doesn't mean you can't find someone willing, does it?"

"This isn't about my motivations," Sasuke insisted, obviously trying to change the subject.

Whatever Sasuke's argument was, Naruto was unhappy with the outcome.

"So you're going to withhold sex because you think that if I'm not getting it from you I might look elsewhere and stop projecting all of my emotional needs onto you?" Naruto asked disbelievingly.

"Yes," Sasuke replied apparently a little surprised Naruto had caught on so quickly.

"You're completely insane, you know that? I'm not projecting, I know the difference between friendships, lust and romance or whatever. Besides it's not like we have any normal kind of friendship to begin with."

"Which I suspect is part of the problem."

Apparently Sasuke was pretty adamant about this and Naruto had to wonder if it was just him Sasuke wanted to prove something to. Most of the time Sasuke acted like he couldn't care less about his emotional well being so naturally Naruto was a little confused about his motivations here.

But whatever, if Sasuke felt like he had something to prove, two could certainly play at that game. After all if they stopped having sex for a while and Naruto didn't immediately want to sleep with someone else, Sasuke might realise that the only reason Naruto wasn't willing to do so now was because having sex with strangers wasn't all that appealing to him and not because he was getting too attached.

And he doubted very much if he was going to be the only one frustrated by the end of this little experiment. And he vowed that he wasn't going to be the first one that was going to crack under the pressure.

Naruto had hoped to have better control. But it had only been three days and already he was beginning to look at his friend like a thirsty man would look at a fountain. A fountain surrounded with barbed wire, electrical fencing and big billboards warning him to keep away. So close yet oh so dangerous.

He decided he'd gotten too used to being able to have sex whenever he wanted and now that he knew he couldn't, it made the wanting ten times worse. But at least his resolve was strong even if his libido was a traitor. But that was completely Sasuke's fault.

Had Sasuke always looked like this? Had he always moved like that? Surely he had, surely it was just Naruto's mind playing tricks on him. But even though he knew that must be the case, abstinence had made him very aware of Sasuke all of a sudden. Which was bizarre.

They were almost completely in one anther's company, they bathed together, ate together, slept... well they didn't generally sleep together but in the general vicinity of one another at least. How could he become even more aware of Sasuke's presence than he was before? Even Sasuke's birthday hadn't left him feeling like this. On that day he'd been anticipating something to happen then and that feeling had made him pay a lot more attention to Sasuke than usual.

But this, this knowing that absolutely nothing was going to happen made that anticipation feel like a mere preview. At least before he'd only been drawn in by the more suggestive actions of his friend. Now it didn't matter how innocent it was, a flick of hair away from his face, a casual stretch of his arms, even him just walking made his mouth go dry.

Now Naruto's eyes tracked his every movement, watching the graceful way his body moved, watching the soft sunlight play against the creamy pale skin, the angles of his face, the expressions, those amazingly dark eyes... Naruto made himself look away before Sasuke could catch his expression.

There was no way in hell he was going to let Sasuke think for a moment that Naruto was checking him out. Naruto himself was disturbed enough by what he was doing as it was that he didn't need Sasuke smirking at him too.

One concession he had given himself lately had been not to bathe with Sasuke though. On most nights it was almost like a regular thing. It was a time of relaxation they used to unwind and talk about the day's events. Well Naruto talked mainly and occasionally Sasuke made the effort too. And as much as it pained Naruto to have this time taken away from him it pained him even more to continue it. And it wasn't just because Sasuke was naked and dripping wet and...

Focus!

... it was because spending that time with Sasuke made him ache all the more. Which was strange. The physical thing he could almost accept. He'd never really thought of himself being attracted to guys in general before but Sasuke was something else physically. He looked almost perfectly good which Naruto was increasingly hating him for at the moment. But he knew by now and had accepted the fact that Sasuke did it for him on a physical level.

But add that to the only times where they got to relax around each other, talk and even sometimes share a joke and a smile and Naruto felt his desire being tugged at all the more.

It made him wonder if there was something to what Sasuke was saying after all. Not that he was projecting, but perhaps he was a little more invested than a normal friendship might indicate. But of course as he'd said to Sasuke they didn't have a normal kind of friendship in the first place so he wasn't sure if in reality this was such a bad thing to have.

Okay so he wouldn't randomly grab any of his other friends and kiss them but he didn't have sex with any of his other friends either. So it was really an odd situation to be in anyway but he didn't see why Sasuke was getting so bent out of shape. This wasn't a romance, gods knew, and Naruto didn't see that it could be so even with the random kissing. So was it entirely possible that it was really Sasuke that was getting a little edgy about the closeness.

When something emotionally new presented itself to Sasuke, he got tense and angry about it even if on some level he actually liked it. He'd been like that at first with the hugs and the cheek kisses.

But then Sasuke didn't seem to get a whole lot of enjoyment with those things even now, but he didn't exactly push him away either. So if Sasuke felt there was something threatening about their arrangement, it seemed logical to Naruto that it was Sasuke's own issues that was making him push Naruto away.

Which was a pity. Sasuke could do with some emotional attachments even on the level he'd been enjoying with Naruto. And it wasn't like Naruto felt that Sasuke should be any more invested than he was, but any emotional connection no matter how small and even only as friends should be a good thing.

But of course saying that it was okay to feel something a friend would, would make Sasuke roll his eyes. Telling him it was also okay to care even more for one particular friend without it having to mean anything weird would cause derision at the very least. Trying to point out to him that feeling that for a friend he just happened to be currently fucking was would probably give him a stroke.

So Naruto decided to be smart about this. Let Sasuke have his space, give him a chance to listen to Naruto about his own feelings and let Sasuke come to whatever conclusion he may. And if Sasuke got half as horribly frustrated as Naruto was by the new arrangement, sex should resume happily and whole-heartedly in a matter of days.

But for now it wouldn't hurt Naruto to give his own libido a rest and missing out on bathing time should help him out with this. And so far Sasuke hadn't really commented on the fact that Naruto had taken to bathing in the morning rather than with him at night time. But Naruto didn't entertain the notion for one second that it was for the same reasons he had.

But tonight Sasuke seemed to have other plans.

Naruto raised his eyes and narrowly caught a bottle as it was thrown towards his head. Upon seeing what it was he looked up to Sasuke who had turned his back and was effectively ignoring him while taking off his shirt.

"I'm not washing your hair teme."

Sasuke dropped his shirt, turned back to Naruto and frowned. "Since when?"

"Since you started getting all freaked out about the closeness stuff," Naruto pointed out. "Normal friends don't wash each other's hair."

This only caused Sasuke's frown to deepen. "I don't wash your hair."

The fact that Sasuke pointed out that the ritual wasn't two sided didn't ease Naruto's mood much.

"I just figured that from now on we don't do anything normal friends wouldn't do. Isn't that what you wanted?"

Sasuke actually seemed a little conflicted after that one. It had taken a lot of effort to make Sasuke admit he liked having his hair played with, such a relatively small thing but one Sasuke saw as incredibly embarrassing. But since it was out in the open he seemed intent on making that admission as worthwhile as he could.

Even when Naruto wasn't washing his hair, sometimes Naruto ran his fingers through it just to see that pleasing moment when Sasuke's features calm, his whole body relax and just see him enjoy something so simple for a change. But Naruto was adamant. If Sasuke wanted to play this game, he was going to play it to the letter or give in.

"It's not a sex thing," Sasuke argued impatiently.

Sasuke being persistent about it though was testing Naruto's new resolve pretty badly. However...

"Neither was the kissing," Naruto returned. "But you still thought it proved something."

"So what," Sasuke began, folding his arms across his chest defensively, "You're trying to get back at me because I'm denying you sex?"

"Why would I get back at you for that? After all you're denying yourself just as much."

"You're pretty full of yourself," Sasuke noted.

"That's pretty rich coming from you," Naruto shot back. "But whatever, it's not like I ever heard you complaining."

Sasuke shut his mouth and held out his hand. Naruto tossed the bottle back to him and Sasuke left without another word.

Overall, Naruto was pretty pleased with himself. He was pretty sure he'd just scored the first point in their little game.

They had just sat down for dinner in front of their campfire. It had been six days since their new agreement and so far things weren't going exactly as Sasuke had planned.

He had hoped to come across a town by now, somewhere where Naruto could mingle with other people and perhaps admit there was something to what Sasuke was saying. But so far it had remained just the two of them and Naruto had yet to openly demand for things to go back to the way they were.

Truthfully Sasuke would have welcomed such a thing if nothing else to strengthen his own resolve against such action, but Naruto was proving to be pretty stubborn about the whole thing. Which normally Sasuke would have been thankful for, but without any signs of Naruto cracking Sasuke felt himself begin to crack under the pressure instead. Not that he would ever admit it, of course not. There would be no point to any of this if he did and he absolutely hated losing.

Unfortunately, his subconscious seemed to have other ideas about losing though. On some level he had expected that things would stay the same minus the sex, inappropriate kissing and touching.

But according to Naruto most of the physical interaction they had should by rights come under the same category of 'inappropriate'. Annoyingly, he had a point but it made the going a little tougher. Sasuke found himself on edge a lot for reasons he had been surprised about at first.

First Naruto had put a stop to the hair washing, and okay, maybe he had a point. But he'd also put a stop to friendly touching of any kind including the weird cheek kiss thing he used to do. Sasuke had tried to point out to him that all of these things had been going on before they had even regained their friendship but Naruto had denied it. According to him he'd thought of Sasuke as a friend at the time and it was all part and parcel of the type of touching friends did not do together normally.

So fine, Sasuke could hardly continue to argue for fear of seeming to sound hypocritical. Even he could see that demanding one thing stop only to keep up a more casual physical closeness was a little strange.

But it seemed that the less physical contact they had, the closer Sasuke found himself literally to Naruto. It was almost like when he could feel the other's person's closeness somehow made up for something else that was lacking. He hated how needy that sounded, but he blamed it entirely on Naruto.

He had gotten so used to the odd casual touch that he felt a little disorientated when it didn't happen with regularity. It was something he had noticed happening before when they had first started getting physical with each other and he'd been annoyed enough about the realisation then, now the dependence pissed him off even more.

Tonight Naruto was sitting on a fallen log eating his food and purely without thinking Sasuke sat down on the ground in front of the log, close enough that he could feel the bump of Naruto's leg against his shoulder. And the moment he realised he'd done this he hated himself so much that he wanted to-

The second he felt fingers brush through his hair his mind ground to a sudden halt and everything that he had been angry at himself about seemed to slip away.

Naruto had evidently finished his dinner and probably didn't realise on any conscious level what he was doing but Sasuke didn't dare draw attention to it anyway. The soft slide of fingers through his hair and across his scalp relaxed him so much it took him a little while to realise when Naruto abruptly stopped.

Opening his eyes, Sasuke looked around at him only to see Naruto smile sheepishly.

"Sorry, habit."

Sasuke could have beaten the shit out of him in that moment but was stalled in his anger again at the sight of the soft curve of lips and the apologetic look in those deep blue eyes, eyes that he used to see almost roll back in pleasure and lips that...

Sasuke sighed and turned back around. "Whatever."

In the morning Sasuke went down to the river to fill his canteen. Naruto had been gone from his bedding but that wasn't unusual. He'd probably gone off somewhere to take a leak and Sasuke wanted to be ready to go the moment he got back.

So with canteen in hand, Sasuke made his way through the trees, down to the river and stopped abruptly on the bank. Okay, so Naruto wasn't taking a leak, he was down here bathing. Well fine, that was fine, so what? Or at least that was what he should have been telling himself. Instead he was routed in place watching the morning light glisten on the water beading over a golden chest.

And Naruto was almost gold. All the traveling in the sun, shirtless on the really warm days had given Naruto a definite golden glow and training along the way without chakra aid had given him clear definition to his muscles. Sasuke watched transfixed as a droplet of water slid down over his chest hovered over a puckered nipple before dropping off and into the water.

Sasuke swallowed thickly.

"What's up?"

The voice almost caused him to bite through his tongue.

"You're holding us up," Sasuke shot back without thinking. He sounded pissed, he knew he sounded pissed and that was because he was pissed. What the fuck was wrong with him? He had thought no sex would make Naruto do desperate things, he didn't think it would impact him at all like this.

Naruto was frowning at him slightly and Sasuke realised why a moment later. He'd sounded annoyed but he probably looked pretty peaked.

"Sasuke, are you all right?" Naruto asked concerned.

"Fine. It's hot this morning," he muttered.

Well that was pretty stupid. Of course it was hot this morning, it was hot every fucking morning. But the unthinking reply did give him some ideas. He would have an excuse to have a swim himself this morning...

Sasuke closed his eyes and resolutely turned away completely forgetting the reason he'd come to the river in the first place.

He was beginning to think that perhaps Naruto wasn't the only one with the problem. Sasuke just had a different problem. Thanks to his reactions he suspected that perhaps his was more a physical problem instead of Naruto's emotional one. But the fact remained the same that perhaps all he needed to get over this physical attraction was to fuck somebody else just like he'd suggested Naruto do.

The thought wasn't a particularly happy one but if indeed his entire problem was physical he shouldn't have a problem relieving his physical needs no matter who it was.

Right?

As it turned out a town presented itself just before sundown after that day's travel and Sasuke breathed an internal sigh of relief. A town meant opportunities on many levels and as soon as Sasuke had a chance to wash up he had plans that would hopefully involve scratching a particularly bothersome itch.

Naruto seemed not to notice anything was amiss until they got to the reception of the nearest hotel and Sasuke asked for two rooms.

"Wait, what?"

"We have enough money," Sasuke pointed out.

"Yeah so? We've had enough money for separate rooms before but we never bothered. Actually now we have even less money than before and you said we had to start being careful with it. Why do we..?"

Sasuke had the unpleasant feeling that Naruto might have caught on when he let that last question fade out. Which he sort of did, but didn't get it exactly right.

"I'm not screwing some random person," Naruto reminded him. "I told you."

"You won't know until you try," Sasuke replied as they went upstairs to their rooms.

Naruto, a couple of paces behind him, seemed unhappy to say the least by this turn of events.

"I don't want to try."

Sasuke suddenly rounded on him, frustration, annoyance and everything else that had been building up over the past week finally getting the better of him.

"Believe me when I tell you that it doesn't matter anymore. Whether you fuck someone tonight or not you're not going to prove some point to me. It's only been a week and just because you don't feel like proving me right tonight doesn't mean that we will suddenly go back to the way things were."

Naruto looked at him with wide eyes that pretty much told Sasuke that this is exactly what Naruto had expected to happen. As if he was going to prove his own point within a week.

Sasuke already suspected it would take a person like Naruto a lot longer to get used to the idea of a one night stand whether he was more comfortable now with sex or not. But no matter, tonight, whether Naruto got laid or not, Sasuke wanted his privacy.

"I know that," Naruto lied quietly.

Sasuke didn't reply. He simply unlocked the door to his room, went inside and slammed the door behind him.

TBC